Shutting Out the Sun exaggerations

“Japan remains among the world’s least open economies, certainly the least open in Asia”

pg 277. Less open than all the Central Asian states? Less open than Burma or Bhutan?

– “Like other women, I would have to choose between my career or my baby, and the reality is most women now are choosing careers”28 year old Japanese career woman Kiyoko, quoted in Shutting Out the Sun pg 162 So that means well over 50% of women are choosing not to have children, and specifically in order to continue their careers (rather than for financial and other reasons). Funny, then, that he mentions several times elsewhere in the book the near impossibility of a woman having a career in a Japanese company

-”So important is work in shaping a man’s identity that when a company confronts some difficulty or scandal,managers are expected to apologize…with their lives”pg 200. This would suggest that most people in those situations would commit suicide, people would be surprised or shocked if they didn’t, or that people dying for their companies are a major group of suicides. None of these are true.